* Although India has allocated 25% vaccines quota for private sector, the rollout of vaccination in private sector is much smaller than 25% compared to overall doses administered in India. We need to fully engage private healthcare infrastructure and catalyze progress towards fully vaccinating all the people.
* Vaccination should happen round the clock, may be in two shifts of total 16 hours, 8 am till midnight. It should be available all days of the week, irrespective of holidays. On public holidays, they should work overtime with higher workforce. Mobile vaccination vans should come handy.
* The Drug Controller General of India (DCGI) should quickly review phase-3 data of the available vaccines to issue a regular license for the tested ones, rather than continuing their Emergency Use Authorisation (EUA) mode.
Covid vaccines approved by the WHO and credible health science regulators have shown to protect fully vaccinated people by significantly reducing the likelihood of them developing any serious outcome if they get infected with corona virus. Like many other vaccines, protection is extremely significant, though not absolute (so those who are fully vaccinated should continue to practice safe methods to reduce the risk of contracting the virus). In countries where large part of the population is fully vaccinated, rate of hospitalisation, intensive care unit admissions, ventilators etc or deaths related to Covid-19 has sharply declined. This stands out in contrast with countries where vaccination rate is low and rate of Covid-related serious outcomes is directly proportional to the number of people who are getting infected. Let's hope that significant part of our global population gets fully vaccinated within the time duration and the pandemic becomes a past.
Bobby Ramakant - CNS (Citizen News Service)
(Bobby Ramakant is a World Health Organization (WHO) Director General's WNTD Awardee and part of CNS (Citizen News Service) and Asha Parivar teams. Follow him on Twitter @BobbyRamakant or visit www.bit.ly/BobbyRamakant)
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